Barbados briefly reimposes Haitian visa block
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By George Alleyne
Barbados’ decision to lift
immigration restrictions on
Haitians and accord them full
rights to visa-free entry has
backfired and caused a reversal
thanks to human traffickers who
gouged money out of many by
misleading them into believing
that they were also free to work
on the island.
Recognising that a long-time
practice of requesting entry
visas of Haitians was an injustice
because the Treaty governing
CARICOM, of which Haiti is a
full member, makes clear that
nationals of all states within the
grouping are guaranteed visa-free
entry into each other’s territory,
the one-year-old Barbados
government swiftly abolished
that immigration hurdle after
being elected to office in May
last year.
But the removal of this
restriction coincided with
introduction of Copa Airlines
flights from Panama to Barbados
that inadvertently provided an
easy air link to Haiti through
connecting flights, and traffickers
convinced Haitians desperate for
work to part with as much as
$3000 and take the two-stage
flight for easily available jobs.
By January stories began
emerging of high numbers of
Haitians stranded in Barbados
because traffickers believed
to be residents of Dominica
Republic, that shares the island
of Hispaniola with Haiti, had
been duping these people and
placing them on flights bound
for what they believed to be wellpaying
jobs.
Untold numbers of Haitians
had been arriving in Barbados
since November 2017, and as
their pocket money ran out
with no job prospects stories of
abandonment and desperation
began hitting local media.
With the prospect of a growing
number of stranded persons who
had exceeded their CARICOM
stipulated six months automatic
residence permit, Barbados
triggered an exemption clause
in the Treaty and re-imposed
visa restrictions as a temporary
measure to halt the influx.
“It was done reluctantly,” the
Barbados TODAY epaper has
reported the island’s CARICOM
Ambassador, David Commisiong
explaining.
“The position was becoming
untenable and corrective
measures had to be taken.
“The Barbados government
felt like it did not have a choice.
We didn’t want to do it, but after
considering all of the possible
ways of dealing with the problem,
it came to the conclusion that
unfortunately the only way
to deal with the problem was
to impose some form of visa
requirement.”
He said that in government’s
reluctant re-imposition of the
restrictions, the administration
had sought to grant exemptions
to certain categories of Haitians,
which makes the immigration
hurdle unlike what obtained in
the past when it applied to all
nationals of the CARICOM sister
nation.
“Haitians who possess
government official passports,
or Haitians who have a business
person’s stamp in their passport
or who possess US, Canadian,
British or European Union visas
don’t require visas to come to
Barbados, but Haitians who don’t
fall into any of those categories
require a visa to come to
Barbados,” said Commisiong.
He said that this is not the end
of hope of ordinary Haitians for
travel to Barbados because the
visa re-imposition is a temporary
measure as government wants,
“to revert to a situation of visafree
access as soon as possible.
“When those problems are
corrected, I believe Barbados will
eagerly go back to the visa-free
regime with Haiti, but at the
same time Government has to be
realistic and sensible.”
CARICOM Ambassador David Commisiong.
Photo by George Alleyne